


Stiletto Heart

by lusilly



Series: Trans Tony [2]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Dysphoria, F/M, Gen, Gender Roles, Happy Trans Character, Nonbinary feels, Post-Iron Man 3, Tony Feels, men in heels, trans tony
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-17
Updated: 2016-07-17
Packaged: 2018-07-24 11:31:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7506574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lusilly/pseuds/lusilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Tony, before his first public appearance after the removal of the arc reactor, reflects on surgeries, dysphoria, and how fucking good he looks in these heels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stiletto Heart

**Author's Note:**

> In-canon with the rest of my short Trans Tony fics (i.e. AU where transphobia isn't a thing, Tony's been out since he was like 21, and also Maria Stark was Puerto Rican).
> 
> Some very gentle, thoughtful talk abt dysphoria and faded scars, so be aware if that's a sensitive subject for you.

            Tony stood before a full-length mirror. He wore a white suit, the jacket just over his shoulders, sleeves hanging emptily. His hands were in his pockets, and he shifted back and forth in front of the mirror, his eyes focused intently on his feet.

            Behind him, a door opened. “Oh my God, there you are,” sighed Pepper; she was in a silky t-shirt and yoga pants, her hair and makeup immaculately done up. Eyes smoky and lips a soft nude, she was a vision even before she slipped into her dress – which was equally as stunning. A young designer whose emails apparently weren’t making it through Stark Industries’ Public Affairs department had @’d Tony on Twitter, and Tony had @’d Pepper, and they’d had an argument when she got home that night because she already had a very beautiful bright pink Valentino and if Tony started replying to every single request from every single trans kid on Twitter he would be granting wishes all day long, to which Tony had replied, indignantly, “Yeah, sure, and remind me again what would be so bad about that?”

            This had caused Pepper to throw her hands up in surrender and storm up to their bedroom, where she locked herself in the bathroom for a long shower which left the mirror clouded with steam.  Downstairs in his workshop, Tony retired to tinker with an old suit, kicking the leg of a table on his way in. This hurt his toe, which made him all that much more upset. When J.A.R.V.I.S. asked, “Would you like some calming tea, sir?” Tony had loudly replied no, he would not like any tea, and quit telling him to calm down. Without another query, J.A.R.V.I.S. began playing a mix of songs precisely for when Tony was in such a mood, which had been compiled via algorithm. What Tony really wanted was a drink, but his psychiatrist had informed him seriously that the anti-anxiety meds didn’t mix well with alcohol, and Pepper was so happy the other night when he declined a glass of wine at a party, so he was trying something new. Sobriety did not suit Tony, but if he was still building suits, he figured he might as well tackle one addiction at a time.

            That night, Tony was unhappy to find the bed empty when he returned upstairs. But he was still in the bathroom brushing his teeth when Pepper appeared, her hair pulled away from her face in a ponytail. He watched as she joined him in the bathroom, taking her own toothbrush. Tony spat into the sink. “How’s the Roxxon deal going?” he asked.

            She shrugged, without looking at him. “Not well. Their environmental standards aren’t up to regulation and they’re trying to negotiate.”

            Tony rinsed his mouth, and spat into the sink once more. “Which, naturally, is pointless.”

            She gave him a conciliatory smile. “Stark Industries doesn’t make compromises when it comes to our ethics.”

            “At least not anymore,” added Tony. The two of them looked at each other for a second, and then he reached out and wrapped his arms around her waist, and she didn’t roll her eyes. When he leaned forward for a kiss, she reciprocated by returning the motion, and their lips touched briefly, chastely. “Sorry,” he said. “I know it’s a mega turn-off when I get all gross and control-y like that. I don’t want to be one of those guys.”

            “It’s not controlling,” she said, shaking her head. “You’re always trying to save the world, whether it’s in the suits or on social media.” There was a momentary pause, and she put her hand on the arc reactor in the center of his chest, its light visible through the thin fabric of his shirt. “I’ll get in touch with that designer,” she said, gently.

            His eyes lit up, and he reached up to take her hand. “Really?”

            “No promises,” she added sternly. “But. I’ll see what she has.”

            “They,” corrected Tony. At Pepper’s look, he clarified, “Neutral pronouns, they-them, I know,” he continued, nodding his head sympathetically, “kids these days, hard to keep up with. Actually I think it’s kind of cute, very avant-garde, stick-it to gender roles.” He gave a little shake of his head. “They-them,” he repeated.

            A proud, loving little smile tugged at Pepper’s lips, and her fingers curled on the arc reactor, allowing him to gently take her hand. “I’ll see what _they_ have,” she amended. “By the way,” she added, tapping on the bright machine in his chest, “your doctor called, she says we can schedule the surgery for the Friday after next if you skip your shot.”

            Tony made a face, but didn’t protest. It was time to get his heart pumping on its own again, even if the thought of another surgery made him feel a little nauseous.

            So it was a few weeks later that he stood in front of the mirror, no bright blue light shining through the suit’s front. Tonight was to be his first public appearance since the removal of the arc reactor, and there was something about the whole hubbub that made him feel strangely young, almost dysphoric in a way he thought he’d left behind years ago. He’d spent a lot of time since the surgery staring down at his bare chest, at the three scars there now. Two of them were old and hardly noticeable now, after almost twenty-five years between them and the knife, and at least a thousand dollars in advanced scar reduction treatments. The third, a patch of scar tissue over his heart, was still ugly and swollen. This had been Tony’s first surgery since he was twenty-two. He hadn’t anticipated the intensity of the sense memory it stirred within him, reminders of a past so far away and fuzzy it might as well have been another life.

            Things were different now. He was Iron Man; he was on the Avengers – with Captain America, no less. He was trying to quit drinking. Kids were using all kinds of new pronouns, some of which made Tony feel strangely at home, when he looked at himself in the mirror and thought of them. Back when he was transitioning, there was a certain amount of waffling in between, of not minding terribly about not being open, that curious thrill when people gave him a double take, uncertain. _In-between_ hadn’t been a permanent option back then, not to his recollection, but it didn’t seem such a terrible place to be.

             When Pepper walked in on Tony in the white suit, she strode forward, barefoot. “Happy is here already, did you tell him to come early? Because I specifically said we wouldn’t be ready until eight o’clock, it’s going to take me twenty minutes to squeeze into that dress-”

            She broke off, close enough to Tony to notice something was off. He was several inches taller than her, his eyes level with her hairline. Wordlessly, she frowned at him, then glanced down at his feet.

            “Oh,” she said, with a hint of surprise.

            Tony turned back to the mirror, shifting his feet. “Did you know we wear the same size?” he asked mildly.

            As Tony admired the black Louboutin stilettos he wore, Pepper watched. “You’re a little bigger than me," she replied; of course Pepper knew this about him. She knew everything about him. "I use your gym shoes because they give me some space. Those are a little big on me too,” she said, pointing at the high heels he wore. When he glanced at her, she explained, “They make my feet swell if I wear them too long, so I sized up.”

            “Good call,” replied Tony, with approval. “You wearing them tonight?”

            “No,” she answered. “Are you?”

            “Thinkin’ about it.”

            “Okay.” She took a few steps back, then held out her hands. “Come over here.”

            He glanced around at her, turning away from the mirror with one eyebrow raised.

            “I’m serious,” she said, gesturing for him to join her. “Try to walk ten feet in them.”

            “Pepper,” he said, as this were obviously foolish. “I learned how to pilot the Iron Man armor, I think I have enough coordination to run around in high heels.”

            “How long did it take you to work out flight mechanics on the suit?” When he did not answer, she gave him a very _I thought so_ look, and then asked, “And when was the last time you got any practice wearing heels?”

            This caused Tony to return to his own self-image in the mirror, his eyes focused on his feet. “When I was fifteen,” he declared, speaking to Pepper without turning around. “I had one of those coming-out parties which, yes, I know how ironic that sounds in retrospect, but my mother wanted to have it early. I guess because it was right around the time I graduated high school, or something.”

            The truth was it hadn’t been a coming-out party. It hadn't been a debutante ball at all; it had been a quinceañera, but Tony had been kept up some nights before the invitations had gone out listening to Howard categorically refuse to let his wife call it that, so he often tried to convince himself he had forgotten that particular fact.

            “But,” added Tony reasonably, managing to turn around to face Pepper, shoes clunking loudly as he did so. “I do wear lifts in my shoes when I’m around Cap, so that’s basically the same thing.”

            Pepper grinned at Tony. “No, it’s not.”

            “Um, basically, it is.”

            “No, it basically isn’t.”

            “But it is the same basic concept.”

            “Your lifts aren’t designed to make your legs look thinner and your ass more toned,” Pepper pointed out. “Or to make it more difficult to run away.”

            “I bet,” began Tony, taking one shaky step towards Pepper, “I can design a shoe just as pretty as this one, with its own internal balancing mechanism to compensate for the poor distribution of weight. My podiatrist would  _not_ be happy with the stress these are putting on my heels right now.”

            “I bet you can’t,” said Pepper, as Tony took another awkward, bow-legged step towards her. She gestured at him, holding her hands out like waiting for a toddler taking his first steps. “Beauty is pain, Tony.”

            Intently focused on the ground before him, Tony replied mildly, “Honey, you don’t have to tell that to _me_.”

            He took another step, and slowly straightened up, apparently finding his stride. With a flirtatious smirk her way, he stomped clumsily across the hardwood floor.

            “Look at me,” he said. “Look at me, I’m totally nailing it. This is nice,” he said, striding with more confidence. “I kinda like this. It’s kind of a power trip.”

            “Yes, it is,” answered Pepper, her smile glowing as he just about got to her, reaching out to take her hands, which she held out for him.

            He was on his last step when he faltered, and his ankle twisted the wrong way, and he almost fell over; Pepper caught him halfway down, and he laughed along with her. “Okay,” he ceded. “Maybe it is a little harder than it looks.”

            “Oh, it is definitely a lot harder than it looks,” she told him wisely, shaking her head. “Which you would know if you’d ever once listened to me complain about them.”

            “I listen,” he protested, with a whine.

            For a moment they stood there together, her hands placed firmly on his arms, keeping him steady. She nodded downwards and said, “I have a very extensive collection of shoes, if you’d like to look for an easier pair.”

            He made a thoughtful face, then a half-grimace, then said, “Nah. Gonna be a lot of attention tonight, what with,” he patted his chest, “and all, and that’d just confuse people. Remember that time Rhodey’s niece painted my nails and the internet exploded?”

            “I do,” replied Pepper. “You’d think they’d never seen a man with a manicure before.”

            “Never a trans man, probably. Guess I’m supposed to stick to boy stuff, cars and guns and explosions and science.”

            “Science has no gender,” corrected Pepper, in the immortal words of the Stark Foundation for Women in STEM.

            “I think science has a gender,” said Tony seriously. “Hell, sometimes I think science is _my_ gender.”

            With a smile, Pepper leaned up to kiss him on the lips. “I could get used to the height, though,” she remarked, lingering at his mouth.

            “Me too.”

            There was another kiss, and this time Pepper raised her hands to hold his face in between her palms, sinking into the kiss, letting his mouth grow hot against hers.

            And then, ignoring the crestfallen whine Tony gave when she pulled away, she tapped gently on the spot on his chest where the arc reactor used to be. “You want to help me finish getting ready?”

            “Does that involve getting you naked and me getting to watch?”

            With a sly smile, she leaned into his chest, looking up at him. “More than watch,” she told him, “if you’re good.”

            Then she drew away from him, leaving his hands reaching for her as she headed back out to where her dress hung waiting for her. Tony made a strangled little sound, tried to follow, then cursed and tried to kick off the heels. “God damn,” he said aloud to no one, leaning down to tug the left shoe, which seemed vacuumed to his foot. “These really do hurt.”

            From the other room, Tony heard Pepper laugh.

            “Told you!” she called.


End file.
